Touched By The Tempest
by QuaternionSoul
Summary: In the horizon the Sun rises and sets over an open road—a road that whispers to runaways and strays alike. Max and Chloe face the guilt of an impossible decision, a tragedy that changed their lives forever. Meanwhile, Max is learning more about her powers, and Chloe is tormented by dreams of things that never occurred. No one remains the same after being touched by the tempest.
1. Runaways (prologue)

**Prologue: Runaways**

* * *

 _ _October 16th 2013—on the road__

* * *

 ** **The blue light**** from the police car struck Max's eye, shot through the rear window. She blinked and slumped back into her seat. The muted sirens rummaged through her brain like crawling insects. She sighed, sinking further down.

"Don't worry, Max. I've got this," Chloe said. Chloe's feet were firmly planted on top of the dashboard. Kicking back while wearing a pair of black aviators—framed by her striking blue hair, it didn't give Max the impression of someone handling the authorities.

The noise stopped. Max heard a car door slamming, and the faint footsteps of the policeman approaching.

"Morning, officer." Chloe waved halfheartedly.

The officer positioned himself at the window—taking in the car, then looked inside of it. "License and registration, please."

Max tensed up. Please don't do anything stupid … she looked away.

"License and registration– _ _what?__ That's not even a question," Chloe said dryly, pausing for effect. Max already cringed. "But maybe you meant to ask __'may I please see your license and registration, miss?' "__

The officer stood quiet, then leaned down to hang on the car door, matching Chloe's height. "Very funny, girl. Can I see your license and registration, please?"

"I definitely think you can," Chloe said, blinking. "Don't be so hard on yourself."

The officer sighed. "I see young people like you out here all the time, looking for trouble for no damn reason. I'm not gonna make it that easy for you. May I have your license, please?"

Chloe grimaced, yanking the license out of a bag on the floor. "Fine. Have it—pig," she said, waving it around. She threw it into the cop's vest, and it dropped into the dirt on the ground.

Max stared in disbelief. "Chloe!"

The officer looked subtly incensed, masking it with a stoic smile. He reached and picked it up, then doubled down on leaning into the window, uncomfortably close to Chloe as far as Max was concerned.

He took some time looking over the license. Max chewed on her tongue. Does she always have to start some shit?

Chloe dropped her feet from the dashboard, leaning forward. She pushed her shades up on her head. "Is there a problem, dude?" Max swallowed. Then the radio clocked on for the regular news broadcast.

 _ _"__ This is the twelve o'clock news, and we finally have some new information for you worried souls out there. Of course everybody's talking about the tornado that hit the coast last Friday, but until now the officials have refused to release any kind of body count,"a man explained. Max froze. She saw Chloe's eyes widen. "Luckily we now know that the damage was isolated, but it's still very much a tragedy for Arcadia Bay—or should I say, what's left of it. It made a clean cut through most of—"

"Max, turn that shit off!" Chloe leaped, slamming the radio button with her fist. The voice cut off, leaving them with a deafening silence.

"Chloe! We have to know _—_ " Despite Max's gut reaction, a nagging self-doubt gripped her immediately. Maybe there was a reason she didn't want to turn the radio back on.

The officer looked thoughtful. He opened his mouth, struggling with something. "Did the two of you just come out of the Bay?"

They both avoided answering. Chloe stared at the earthy road ahead of them, trailing into the distant horizon.

"I…" The officer started, looking ahead at the road, then back at them and the car, reassessing the situation. He chewed on it for a moment, then shook his head. The officer threw the license back into the car. "Have a good day, miss Price." He stepped back from the vehicle, eyeing them over one last time, meeting Max's eyes with a knowing look. He spoke solemnly. "Take care out there. I know how it sounds—but people lose their damn minds out on the open road—it happens all the time." The officer turned and walked back to his car.

Max held the Polaroid photo she had kept from the week before, her eyes lingering on the wing of a blue butterfly, broken by the jarring paper-white where its completing fragment used to connect. She had thrown it to the long arms of the storm _—_ to be eaten—sacrificing their hometown in the process, all to save her best friend's life.

The police car took off ahead, driving toward future things—unlike Max, it seemed. Moving forward only took her further back in time, wondering about what could've been. It seemed to haunt her everywhere they went, and if that was a taste of what life on the road was, she wasn't sure if it was worth it.

Chloe gripped the keys to start the ignition, but lingered absentmindedly. Max watched the photo piece reflecting in the daylight. The blue butterfly's broken state was, she realized, obvious without her actually looking at it or even touching the broken side. It was a lack of presence. When Max had looked at one of her photos, its artistic impression had taken her to a unique nostalgia of the moment it had captured, and that feeling sometimes invoked in her a vivid presence of the past. That was when something already strange got even stranger.

The mysterious blue butterfly sat captured on a bucket in the dark bathroom corner. At first her power to time travel into photos had hit her like a drug _—_ sending her senses spinning into some kind of vortex, and the sensation at the end of that could only be described as something like a black hole. It pulled and crushed her head at an accelerated speed—but also condensing itself into an eternal second—and when it was finally over, it was just that—over as if it had never happened, like waking up from a dream.

Max leaned to gaze out of the passenger window. Lately though, some of the finer points of the travel had dawned on her, and she knew that there was more to come. Her power seemed to grow together with her. But for better or worse, the butterfly photo was nothing but a dull weight in her hands.

Chloe took her hand. "Max. It wasn't fair to put all of that on you. Not for me, or for anyone else. Whoever gave you your power is an asshole."

Later on, Max stared at the trees passing by along the roadside as they drove, vanishing into their past like the bodies they had left behind. Like the countless faces, children and pets left in their wake, increasingly becoming just numbers—a vague sketch in Max's selectively photographic mind.

Chloe's eyes roamed the woods surrounding them. Max would never apologize for saving her life, she thought. She had leaped at the opportunity to sacrifice herself when it truly mattered, just like the selfless superhero she had pretended to be when they were kids. It's like she knew that the games were over, and that it was time to become that hero. Max didn't have the heart to let her die in that moment, and maybe some would say that was her super-weakness.

Still, Chloe was one of the few people, Max realized—that she deep in her heart knew deserved better. Max tried to believe in people, but they were usually complicated and uncertain—and like a child, Chloe was not. She wore her heart on her sleeve for better or for worse. To Max she had become a symbol of the human condition, and if she could save her, then maybe there was hope to save everyone else as well.

Max would've had to let Chloe die in pain on the cold bathroom floor, believing she was abandoned and unloved in her final moments as she bled out. Whatever the right choice was, she hadn't found it yet. __Fuck that.__

Chloe gazed at the horizon line as they drove, expressionless. Everything had changed since they were kids, and now they were actually heroes in some sense—except Max hadn't learned how to do any of it right yet. Her big heroic moment had involved either making things worse, or to do nothing in the face of injustice.

 ** **Having powers really sucked.****

"Alright, fuck this place." Chloe finally said. "Let's go, super Max." Chloe turned on the ignition and burned tire.


	2. Chapter 1: Hearts of Fire & Frost

**Chapter 1: Hearts of Fire & Frost**

* * *

 _May 14th 2010—on the road to L.A._

* * *

 **"** **Wakey—wakey, miss sunshine!"** A voice chimed.

Chloe's eyes trapped sunlight, the red-orange orb going down in the back of the distant landscape. She yawned. A face emerged in the blur—Rachel.

"I guess—I really fell asleep, huh?" Chloe said.

Rachel leaped onto the seat, playfully leaning over Chloe. Their faces lined up, her blonde hair falling to make them a cover against the golden hour-light. "You're adorable when you snooze, do you know that?" Rachel smiled.

"And you're adorable when you wake me up like it's actually morning."

"Oh, don't you even try to pretend!"

Chloe chuckled. "Pretend what?"

"That you don't love it! And besides, you know why." Rachel said, turning to the front of the car. "I love traveling at night." She threw her hands out as if framing the starry night sky in her imagination. "The company of the stars," she opened her palm. "The mysterious dark road ahead …" Her hand waved low. "It's the perfect adventure for two stray cats like us to make their secret escape, don't you think?" She winked.

Chloe got up in the seat, her neck stiff from sleeping against a small pillow on the side of the door. But that same pain returned her to the memories of last night, and a very different set of sensations—of Rachel snuggling up to her that night, their hands interlocking, the various ways they had twisted around and caressed each other … all serving to remind her throughout the night that she was still there.

"What do you think?" Rachel said, pointing outside.

"About what?" Chloe grinned. "The Sun? It's practically beaming, Rachel."

"No, goofball! Down there."

Chloe looked down the hillside next to where they had parked. There was a beautiful blue lake next to an empty camping spot where they could make a fire, grill hot dogs and spend some more time together. Maybe time like last night. Busy with whatever amused them, doing whatever with whichever ... Chloe bit her lip. and not a spare idiot back in the bay would ever even have to know. That seemed ... nice.

"And that was the only question Chloe Price had to ask herself thatevening," Rachel said, putting on a narrator voice. "Did she smell worse than she felt hungry, or was she hungrier than she smelled like beef jerky?"

Chloe pushed at her shoulder. "Oh, shut up. My car smells like a chem lab because of your toxic stink bombs!"

Rachel giggled. Looking at the view, they leaned into each other.

"Beef jerky?"

Rachel looked at her seriously. "You know what they say—you are what you eat."

They sat quietly. Chloe wrapped an arm around Rachel. The moment was just as mushy as she had imagined it would be before they ran away together, and to say that it was a-okay was the understatement of a century. But when did things ever end up like this for Chloe Price?

"Rachel."

"Yeah?"

Chloe paused. She almost didn't ask, her heart sinking as she did. "Is this a dream?"

Rachel looked at Chloe sideways, empathetic. She put her own arm around her to reciprocate, slowly stroking her hair downward to lovingly press her earlobe, then cradling her head against her own. "Shush. Don't think too much about it, my pretty little runaway. You kept doubting this would ever happen, but you hella got out of the bay, didn't you?"

Chloe looked at her. "Yeah," she said, smiling. "I guess I hella did."

"It's real, then. When you're on the road, I'll always be right here with you." A moment passed.

"Hey! What happened to my morning kiss, ms. Amber?"

Rachel motioned as if to brave the seats again, but hopped and mounted Chloe's lap, pushing in her knees to rest them around hers, completing them. Rachel gazed at her with a sensual fever in her eyes. "That's mrs. Amber these days as far as she's concerned," she said, her mouth quirking into a half-smile. "And as for forgetting that kiss …" She began to whisper. "That's not a mistake she'll be revisiting any time soon."

Rachel stroked Chloe's hair again, her fingers exploring down a few strands, slipping out on the skin of her neck. Chloe held her breath. Finally Rachel leaned in, trapping Chloe's eyes with her soulful own, right before they locked lips.

Run, pass, score. Chloe's mind blew into a thousand exposed pieces, a hazy cloud the only thing remaining inside her head as she melted into Rachel's electrified arms.

Following their refuge against space and time and the karma that they prayed would never catch up with them on the roads to L.A, Chloe gazed over the scenery. Then she looked at the road on the other side of where they had parked. She noticed something moving across it.

A small fawn, maybe only a few months old, stumbled across the road. It looked hurried and pale. It started toward them, and Chloe thought she heard the sound of a vehicle in the distance.

"Rachel, look!"

Rachel didn't reply. Chloe's eyes shot to the right. The seat was empty, and a light breeze poked her from the opened car door. When she looked back to the road, she saw Rachel running out to the helpless fawn—and a semi truck speeding toward them both, veiled by the brushes in the woodland corner.

Chloe shot the car door wide open, her heart caught in her throat. "Fuck!"

Chloe leaped out of the car and bolted after Rachel, but her left foot stuffed itself under a veiny root on the roadside, making her face-plant straight into the dirt. Everything suddenly screamed inside—as she was unable to reach out in anything but what felt like the slow motion of a moment that escaped her grasp; buried feelings turning around like knives and tearing her gut apart from the inside.

Just barely realizing that her face had gone numb, her head shot back up, just in time to see the headlights of the truck streaming around Rachel's faint silhouette, together with that of the small fawn—a blur disappearing into the light—as primal and unrealized as a blank and barren canvas.

Everything was a lie, and nothing was real.

* * *

 **October 17th 2013—on the road to nowhere**

* * *

The Polaroid camera flashed as Max took a photo of Chloe sleeping.

Chloe shook awake, her discolored eyes shot wide open. "No!" She screamed, startling Max as she was pinching the photo.

Chloe stared into the dashboard with a hand holding onto it, expressionless—then searched outside. Rain pattered on the windshield like dark pebbles.

"Uh—Chloe?" Max could see the gears turning in her mind. Chloe looked back inside the car, the color draining from her face. Max leaned back as she realized what had just happened.

"Fuck—no, fuck!" Chloe slammed the left-side window glass with the side of her fist, the vibration of the bang so sharp Max could feel it in her bones. She jerked backward. Chloe rolled away from her and into the rain-splattered window.

Max heard a sharp gasp stifling a sob—Chloe's face concealed. She fucking hated that this kept happening, but she never knew what to do or say when it did. And the lash outs were only getting worse.

"Dream?" Max asked pointedly after waiting a while.

"Yeah."

Max looked at the photo she had just taken. It had seemed like nothing particular a moment ago, yet now it produced a bitter taste in her mouth. It reminded her of the kind of horrible photo from back then; the kind that he would take and put into one of his folders.

Even though it disgusted her, she didn't tear it or throw it away. She opened the glove compartment and filed it away in her busy collection. A perverse photo wasn't about to make anything much worse for them anymore.

"Why are you taking those?" Chloe asked, still glued to the window.

It was a fair question. "I—"

"Didn't that freak teacher kill your passion for photography or something, Max? Wasn't that what you told me?"

"It's not—I'm not doing it for fun, Chloe." Max said. "It's complicated."

"Yeah," Chloe said, laughing. "Really fucking complicated. Gotta have a lot of rewinds to watch my mental breakdown in four dimensions."

Something stirred painfully inside Max. "Chloe, shut the fuck up. I'm sorry, but …" She sighed. "Please."

Chloe was quiet, then turned to Max, her shades covering her eyes and any indication of what she was really feeling—yet her mouth curved slightly. "Since when did little doe-eyes grow such sharp claws?"

Max stared at her. She dropped back in the seat. "Funny. I'm just trying to piece things back together. Is that kind of thing even possible anymore?" Max's mind went to the torn butterfly photo in the glove compartment.

"Well, in case you wanted to ask me—I'm fine," Chloe said. Max didn't know how to interpret her tone, especially not with her eyes covered. A transparent lie like that would normally be sarcasm, but it didn't sound familiar to her anymore. Chloe carried on, and Max could see traces of the tears that had run down her cheek.

Max ground her teeth. "Chloe, when are we going to…"

"Oh, of course," Chloe interrupted. "This again—what's the fucking point, Max? Could you explain that to me?" Max could see Chloe's fingers clawing into her seat. She was exercising a lot of self-restraint.

"I'm just—don't you want to ... just know?"

"No, I don't Max. It won't make the shoulder-deep shit we're in smell any better. I don't have any powers like you—this is the world I choose to live in."

"You know that's not true!" Max's stomach turned. She couldn't believe what she was hearing—that her own shitty decisions could ever make Chloe turn them against herself of all people.

"It doesn't matter Max!" Chloe yelled. "Don't you get it? It won't change that they all died for us."

Max froze.

Chloe's voice grew quiet. "And it sure as hell won't undo that I'm shit-cursed to live trapped between a timeline that never happened—and one where too much shit happened all at once, Max."

Max sat back, clenching her teeth bitterly. It wasn't going anywhere like this. Running away hadn't solved any of their problems, and she could scarcely believe what they had been thinking when they did. At first, things had looked like they might be okay. They were just excited to be on the open road, ready to make of the world what they wished—a freedom both of them had strongly felt that they hadn't had. Max had found it inside herself to for once say fuck you to all of her responsibilities. Chloe had seemed … strangely distant.

Chloe didn't worry her at the time, but Max had started to believe that she should have. The red flags were all there. Chloe was a unique breed of something fierce and something fragile—one that wasn't always easy to comprehend in practice. And the more days they spent on the road the more nightmares Chloe had about Rachel, and the less she wanted to talk about Arcadia Bay.

Cursed to live trapped between two times, Chloe had said. An idea popped into Max's head—something likely silly—but an idea nonetheless. She needed anything to take her mind off their life in a state of limbo, anything to break out of it all.

Opening the glove compartment, Max pulled out the butterfly photo from her collection box. Even though it was broken, it was still something—and it carried that something of what it used to be. It was time to start thinking outside the box that her choices had created for them. Maybe somewhere along the shorelines of Arcadia dust the missing photo piece was calling out, and maybe the piece in her hand could reveal something that could unseal their restless fate.

It was worth a few sleepless nights and a cigarette, Max thought.


	3. Chapter 2: The Art of Merz

_April 22nd 2013 – The Dark Room_

* * *

 **Rachel opened her eyes, but everything stayed black.** Her head ached with a pain like sharp needles, and her left shoulder pressed numbly against the cold and hard floor.

She pushed against the wall, rolling over. A white light overcame her from a photo set in the middle of the room. She took a deep breath. "H-hello? Is anyone here?" The silence chased her voice away.

What the hell was going on? Trying to remember something, anything—Rachel felt displaced in time, like someone in an editing room had chopped her timeline into pieces and dropped her ahead of the plot.

Rachel tried to move some more, but something forced her wrists and ankles tightly together, suffocating the skin to the point of draining blood.

A clanking sound echoed, followed by an eery quiet. Then footsteps on the cobble floor, coming closer. "Oh. So you're finally awake."

Nathan Prescott. Rachel shot him a concerned look.

"This is so perfect. Sorry for tying you up, Rach—but I think you will understand once you see the results."

"Nathan, where the hell are we?"

"Somewhere private." Nathan took off his jacket, walked away and threw it on the table. "Oh, and your favorite teacher's on his way," he said, his eyes like glass as he turned from her. "He's just coming to check out the present I got him, and then we have some time all to ourselves. That's what you wanted, isn't it?" Nathan turned around, testing a syringe. He smiled.

Rachel's eyes widened. "Mark?" She considered the situation. "Don't involve him in this, Nathan." She jerked around and got up to sit in her awkwardly constricted state. "You're strong—I've told you that, remember? You don't need to prove yourself to me—or to anyone else." She forced a smile. "Let's get out of here and do something fun."

A deeper voice appeared from the dark. "Leaving already, Rachel?" His face emerged out of the shadows. It was Mark Jefferson.

Mark paced into the room slowly, looking over to the set lights and then to Rachel. He turned to Nathan. "You've done good bringing her here. Assuming of course that you weren't stupid, like we talked about—wouldn't want anyone misunderstanding this whole thing, would we?" He smiled. "But I think you should go back to school for now—it's almost time for first period, isn't it?"

Nathan's eyes flared. "What? But you said that—"

"No!" Mark shouted, shutting him up. His anger quickly dissipating, he smiled again. "Nathan, I've told you to listen to me carefully," he said. "I don't have patience for your misunderstandings anymore. Right now I need to talk to Miss. Amber. Alone."

Nathan looked over at him, and then to her. "I …" His hand formed a fist. "Whatever. I'll be back, okay?

"Don't forget what you promised." He puffed at their teacher, then grabbed his jacket and stormed out.

"Mark, what the hell is this?" Rachel said. She tried to pull her wrists apart to no avail.

Mark walked closer. "I'm sorry, dear—but you already know what's going on here."

She watched him closely.

"It's Nathan. You know how sensitive he is," Mark started.

She narrowed her eyes.

"I told him I wanted to show you this place, and—well clearly, he overreacted." He sighed. "I've referred him to a few mental health experts, but for now we're stuck dealing with his little … tantrums." He walked over to the set lights and started repositioning them.

Rachel wavered for a moment, then felt something more bitter than the dirt to where she'd soon return. She stared into the floor, lost in thought—her heart infected by something, winning her over against her will, one piece at a time.

"So untie me then, Mark." She said, filling in the blanks leading her to their inevitable conclusion. "This wasn't just a tantrum, and you know that. You're enabling him. Why?"

Mark walked over holding a camera. "I know, dear. I'm just going to take a few shots, if you don't mind? Then we'll deal with Nathan. Don't you remember what we talked about a couple nights ago?"

Rachel stared at the bright light reflected in the hazy cobble.

"Light, Rachel—not unlike being blinded by the the Sun ... it's destructive, yet has extraordinary beauty. In the story with Icarus nobody forced him to lose his wings—it was for its beauty that he sacrificed everything. He had a lot in common with us artists."

Rachel clenched her teeth, then focused on him. "You're not giving me a choice here, Mark. I'd rather die on my own terms. Untie me—now!" She yelled, her eyes opening wide.

Mr. Jefferson looked up from his camera, frowning. "Disappointing. I thought you would be more—mature—about this. You're acting like you're just another spoiled Blackwell kid.

"Rachel, I wanted to put our little theory to the test. But you're quite … resilient. I'm unfortunately going to have to hurt you. I know you will understand once it's all over. You're not as naive as all the others."

Rachel's heart sunk. The final puzzle piece locked into place inside her mind, all the conversations she had with Mark framed in a new light—and all the beauty in the world began to look like a rainfall of ash she had mistaken for snow. Everything except one person—a figure with a beanie, walking away from her in the backdrop of the ashen bay. She was as bright pretty as she could ever recall, but fading into another life. A lump formed in her throat, and the restraints ached harder against her.

Mr. Jefferson walked over to the table where Nathan had teased the syringe. "Of all the things you can do with your life, Rachel—there's nothing more noble than to die for art. I will too, in my own way. We're in this together, you and I."

Rachel felt her stomach twisting at the juxtaposition. She wanted to throw up, but her heart turned into stone—and then she screamed.

While her voice echoed—trapped inside the bunker—other noises joined in. First one that sounded like a thunder clap, and then another clanking from the door over the exit stairs. Rachel stopped, tears running down her face.

Mark Jefferson turned around. "Nathan, listen you dumb fuck—" A loud bang chopped through Rachel's ears, and before she could register anything that had happened, Mark fell dead to the floor, his body collapsing cold in front of her. Rachel staggered back, falling over in a bundle.

A figure in the dark leaned over Mark's body and dragged him, struggling with his weight. After pulling it a distance away, it entered into the light. It was a girl with brown hair and a Jane Doe t-shirt, sucking on a cigarette with a torn off filter. Her eyes looked weary dark blue. It was Max Caulfield—Chloe's best friend.

"Good thing you're still kicking it," Max said, her voice rehearsed. She sat down on the floor, her legs crossed, looking like she was on a field trip. She inhaled and puffed some smoke. "You know, we've both picked up some really bad habits from a mutual friend. Mine is smoking—yours is to get yourself killed."

Rachel opened her mouth. "Wh—what? What the hell are you talking about—Max? How did you find this place?"

Max stared at her quietly, her eyelids droopy. Then she spoke."Why does it always come back to you?"

"I'm sorry?" Rachel twisted her arm, working her burning wrists out of the restraints.

"You—Rach. Why does it all trace back to you—every single time? Why can't people just let you die, like everybody else does?"

Rachel stared at Mark's stiff body, dark blood pooling around his head, then looked back at Max. She didn't care that she had just killed someone.

Rachel recalled the mental image she had of Chloe when she thought she was about to die. No acting trick would save her anymore, her eyes filling back up with tears.

Max leaned over to the body and put the cigarette butt in-between Mark's cold lips. Her mouth curved into an ironic smile. "Smoking kills."

Rachel looked back into the cobble floor that had become a mirror for her inner demons, then back up to meet Max's eyes. "Max," she started. As soon as she spoke she began to choke up, unable to hold back. Her body suddenly trembled. "I don't know who … I don't—"

Max raised an eyebrow. "Who Mr. Jefferson is? Sorry to break the news, princess—but he's a psychopath. You picked the wrong boyfriend. Go fish."

"No …" Rachel said. "Not that." She let herself sink and slowly fell over, lying on the floor facing Mark. She stared intently at Mark's dead eyes, then back at Max. "I don't know who I am anymore, Max."

Rachel struggled, swallowing. "I had a dream … that—I was with Price, and we were sitting in her truck parked at a camping area. We had just run away after a Shakespeare play at Blackwell. I played Prospera, and she was an extra as my Ariel.

"It was just a dream, you know—yet it was happier than any real moment in my life, Max. It's like I'm stuck on the B-side, like something went hella wrong and I don't know what. I don't know what to fucking do about it, Max. But maybe you do, since you came in here all guns blazing." Her eyes rolled over to Max.

"Wait … you never ... told me that part before." Max looked intrigued.

Rachel blinked. "Before? What's up with you? Are you gonna tell me you're a time traveller or something?"

The tired girl grinned.

* * *

October 17th 2013 – On the road of omens

* * *

It was almost time to drive again, but Chloe needed to light one.

Before they left the rest stop she gleaned over at Max. She was occupied with the book she had given her on Chaos Theory, one she had originally gotten from Samuel at Blackwell. Chloe decided to sneak out to the back of the car for a few minutes of ritual brooding.

Chloe sank into the grass, resting her head against the back bumper. She put the smoke into her mouth—then the lighter to her smoke—which put the smoke into her mouth. Elegant little arrangement of chemistry right there.

Why was Max reading that book so fucking much? The question that worried her was specifically why, not that she did. Books aren't much use if they're not read—but if she was torturing herself over the past, she had to stop.

Chloe took a drag.

But then again, maybe she could actually … fix things. What that meant however, Chloe had no idea. She already felt herself preparing to sacrifice herself all over again. Maybe that was her mission after the Prescott's had fucked them all over. Maybe next time she could go out with a bang like in one of her many daydreams–kamikaze straight into the fucking Sun. Good night, rich kid.

Chloe took a final drag, then put the smoke out against the grass.

She had dreamed of Rachel again. This time she had been dressed as Prospera—an odd little callback—and her car was parked at the end of a cliff at a steep fall into nothing. They were sitting on the hood, legs dangling out over the drop.

"What do you think?" Rachel asked, looking at her.

"I think if we don't put the car in reverse we're hella dead."

Rachel was quiet. "Usually I'd chuckle and be all smiles over your jokes, Chloe–but I'm trying to have a serious moment here."

"Noted." Chloe looked out over the edge. Who's joking?

"Let me be more direct," Rachel said, turning and holding her hand. "Why do you think I'm here?"

"What do you mean?"

"Why do you suppose you keep dreaming about me?" She looked out at the cloudy sky.

Chloe frowned. "Because I miss you, Rachel. Is that so hard to believe?"

"You have Max. So why do you think you're still so lonely?"

"Lonely? I..."

"Let me tell you what I think," Rachel said. "It's because I remind you of what it's like to really be alive.

"I know your secret, Chloe Price. You weren't born an ass-kicking blue-maned punk with tats and the 'tude."

"I wasn't?" Chloe smiled.

"Sometimes, the answers are sort of already there within you—in your mind. But you need something to remind you. Remember all those times you've died? When you got shot by Nathan, then Jefferson … hell, even when you shot yourself, you crazy girl?"

"Okay yeah—I see your point. No need to rub it in."

"Do you, though?"

Chloe filled up with a strange sensation. "Wait—why do I remember all of that?"

Rachel pulled her legs up and stood up on the hood, facing the drop. "Sometimes I ask myself, Chloe … why do we remember anything at all. Isn't it because it's a part of us?"

Chloe looked at her, then out at the view. In the sky were three clouds that interlocked into a doe-like figure with eyes, ears and everything.

Rachel began reciting: "I have done nothing but in care of thee, my dear one, thee–who art ignorant of what thou art, nought knowing of whence I am." She leaned forth with her arms out, like a bird tasting the splitting of the wind. "I'll see you around, Price. Don't keep letting people waste you, the world gets lonelier each time you go." She dove gracefully, vanishing into the boundless.

A loud crack whipped the sky, and Chloe found herself back in the grass. Thunder. The air smelled petrichor, but she didn't remember it raining.

Normally she took smoke breaks while Max was asleep, unless it was one of those times they were sharing one. She would probably come asking why they weren't on their way yet. And if it was gonna rain, they might as well bolt. The car door slammed.

"Chloe?" Max called, coming around the car. "Chloe."

"What up, buttercup?" Chloe shot her a sideways glance.

"Chloe, listen up. I don't have a lot of time and I'm getting really fucking tired of doing this."

Chloe jumped out of the grass, taking one glance at Max then freezing. Her eyes were intense, like back when they were tracking down Nathan and she had just rewound using Warren's photo.

"There are things your Max needs to know about. This is not going to make any sense to you at all, but you have to remember everything—and you have to tell her everything I say. If it succeeds, we can bring back Rachel Amber."

* * *

Moments later—On the road to realizations

* * *

Max opened her eyes. She was sitting in the car holding a selfie, but she didn't recognize it, or remember ever even falling asleep.

"Max, you're back!" A voice stabbed. It was Chloe, standing outside the car leaning over her. "So what do you think, Doc Strange?"

"What—What's going on?" Max looked around her, then saw a selfie lying on the floor of the car, which was the last one she last remember taking. Someone had replaced it with the one in her hands.

"Duh—another Max traveled in time using that photo you took, said a bunch of things and then took another photo."

"That's … not very obvious at all, Chloe. What did she say?"

"That's the cool part, Max!" Chloe hurried around the car and bounced into her seat. She turned to her, concentrating. "She said that we can bring Rachel back!"

Max gaped. "What? How?"

Chloe pointed to the selfie. "That."

Max looked down, scanning it. "It's just a selfie, Chloe. I don't know what to tell you."

"Oh, yeah right," Chloe said, closing her eyes to focus. "There's more. You have to use … the power. Of. Merz."

"The power of ... Merz?"

"Exactly." Chloe opened her eyes, staring back seriously.

Max started grinning, then laughed.

"What's so funny? This might be what you've been looking for in your books this entire time, Max!"

"How is dada art going to help us turn back time?" Max giggled frantically, covering her mouth. "Merz was a niche art style in the 1920s, are you sure I haven't just gotten bored with my powers and started pranking you?"

"Yes, that's it! She said you'd know about it!" Chloe leaned in.

"Know what, that I'm pranking you?" Max grinned.

"No, I—" Chloe threw up her hands. "Whatever! Merz, Max. It's collages, right? You turn random scrap items into works of art?"

Max paused. She remembered the butterfly photo, but didn't know how Kurt Schwitter collages could possibly explain chaos theory.

"Listen, she talked a lot—and you know I would never google this crap on my own."

That much Max knew was true.

"She explained that you're still a few weeks away from discovering the next level, but she could hella help give us a boost."

"How?" Max looked at the selfie as if interrogating it.

"Merz, Max. Didn't you listen?"

"Yeah, dada art—what in Caesar's ghost do I do with that?"

"I guess you go dada on that selfie, Max Pollock!"

"It's Schwitter, actually." Max said absentmindedly, staring into the photo. The eyes looking back in the photo looked odd, like they were seeing something in the backdrop. She could see that her other version had been in a hurry, but the picture still felt … highly deliberate. Max noticed it was framed creatively, though, at an angle that gave it an unusual depth given the particular lighting. It's not something she would ever take herself, for sure.

Then Something wobbled inside her body. Huh. She was still pretty tired, clearly.

Then it wobbled again, and a warm sensation shot into her chest as the wobbling turned into a frantic spin inside of her.

Max was frozen still, and the photo itself started to look … loud, and bright.

"Max, is it working?" Chloe's voice came through muted, echoing a hundred miles away.

"Chloe, I … I don't know—what's happening. I don't feel so good."

Light shot out of the picture and overcame Max, thousands of mumbling and yelling voices passing her by like on some kind of highway she couldn't see. She found herself flying through an ocean of light, sparkling figures streaming throughout and around her, above and below with no end in sight.

 **"How the fuck—how did you find Rachel's grave, Max? You've made things very messy ..."**

 **"Max? Are you still alive?"**

 **"You know, we've both picked up some really bad habits ..."**

 **"I will never get tired of watching you bleed, Mr. Jefferson."**

 **"Max! Please, we can talk about this … don't do anything stupid ..."**

A sweeping sensation built up until something audibly popped, and Max found herself standing in her old dorm room at Blackwell.

Wowser … how did I rewind back here? There were no plants in the room, and the floor looked unusually tidy. The window was barred up with wooden planks.

Max took a few tentative steps, looking around, then went to the door. She pulled and rattled the handle, but it wouldn't open.

A creepy noise came from behind and startled her, and she swung around back to the window. It was no longer barred up, showing a starry sky outside. The door she had just attempted to open was gone as well, the corridor outside nothing but a black void.

Max sneaked back into the center, eyeing the door in anticipation.

Out of the walls crawled a shimmering, translucent barrier, one Max remembered very well. Reality was breaking again. It moved in on her, then slowed to a halt, locking in place.

Max swallowed nervously.

The only place that wasn't covered by the barrier was the place where her bed used to be, but it was no longer there. On the wall was a photo collage more elaborate and detailed than any she had ever had—with strings connecting the photos into patterns and sequences.

Max walked up to it, looking at the photos. Most of them were selfies, but some were of other seemingly random things. Then she found a few of Chloe—one similar to the one she had taken of her dancing on Chloe's bed, and others she didn't recognize. Finally, there were photos of Rachel.

In the center of the collage sat a particular photo of her, one where she was dressed up as a punk rocker and having fun with Chloe at some sort of concert. Under on the Polaroid's white-space someone had written:

 **SAVE RACHEL AMBER, SAVE ARCADIA BAY.**


End file.
